Some dentists struggle to get their teams to follow systems and focus on opportunities when seeing patients.
Firstly, It’s important you discuss any new or amended systems with your team to make sure they ‘sign up’ to them.
Then it’s down to the communication structure in your practice.
It’s vital to bring your team together systematically. This will keep your team focused on following the systems agreed. It will also ensure they remain aware of your goals and their part in achieving them.
I’ll cover two key meetings here: the daily huddle and the full team meeting.
A daily huddle can aid team focus and increase the success of your business in one go.
Dental teams tend to include part timers, so not everyone is always around, but it’s important to hold these huddles routinely with the people who are present.
In 15 minutes you can:
Look back at the day before:
- at any system which was dropped (bringing your team back to your vision and core values and how the particular system links to these helps them understand its importance)
- at the systems which went well and how this providing a great experience and feedback from patients
Look at today, reviewing your day sheet to:
- share information about the patients you are seeing, especially who are new patients for the team to introduce themselves to, those who aren’t seeing the hygienist but should be, those who will need follow up calls etc.
- highlight end of treatment patient opportunities – recommendation cards / patient story capture for marketing
Look forward to the next few days to:
- agree how you will fill any gaps in the diary
- highlight any habitual FTA patients who should be called (as well as reminded by text) to make sure of their attendance
- highlight any lab work due / needing to be chased
Make sure you keep to a format such as this, so conversations don’t go off on a tangent and you’ll keep to time.
A longer monthly team meeting will allow you to review the results of your daily huddles, such as reviewing your monthly One Page Plan which shares your Key Performance Indicators if you have one (and you should!), and the project plan for your business.
A project plan captures the projects and actions on your goals. So it’s vital to put one together if you want to manage and complete the projects which contribute to your business success.
You can also make sure you highlight the progress you have seen in these meetings to keep your team motivated.
Make sure your team meetings not only have an agenda, but also that someone produces minutes capturing the actions agreed and who is to take them. You can then circulate the minutes to anyone who wasn’t at the meeting and also follow up on the progress on the actions.
Start with getting these two meetings happening consistently and you’ll really begin to see a difference in your team’s focus.
Have a question about team focus and communication? Jot it down in the box below and I’ll be sure to reply. I’m here to help.
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